Calvin Harris—“Summer”
#69
When pop producers go EDM, their productions are still recognizable as pop—the beats and flourishes may be different, but the overall structure holds tight to tradition. When DJs go pop, though, the result is often a clumsy mess. Approached from the EDM side the traditions don’t merge as well. The structure is all wrong, builds and bridges are truncated or stuck in the wrong places, and the emotional resonance built into the forms are lost in the collision. This isn’t to fault the DJs. Anyone can hang a new sound on an existing structure, but attempting to make music in an entirely new framework is much more difficult. I get the feeling Calvin Harris really is trying to do something different, but I’ll be damned if I know what it is, and I’m not sure he does, either. Harris doesn’t write songs in the formal sense—”Summer” consists of a single verse with no actual chorus—and his music is full of cliches, taken either from EDM or rock. He does his own singing, though, which, considering his voice is reminiscent of Dr. John’s, only without resonance, is brave of him. His voice provides the only semblance of humanity on the record, and it’s welcome. But with these lyrics and this music, it doesn’t make things that much better, and I doubt that anything could.
Tim McGraw—“Lookin’ For That Girl”
#96
I appreciate McGraw’s willingness to toy with his sound—here he uses a drum machine, voice filters, and a lot of autotune—but it doesn’t make his songs any better. In fact it may make him settle for mediocre material figuring he can gussy it up. He can’t.
Ellie Goulding—“Beating Heart”
#98
“The departure lounge of disbelief”? Are you fucking kidding me?